


A Key to All Mythologies

by MrProphet



Category: Middlemarch - George Eliot, Primeval
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-21
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-10-22 04:21:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10689645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MrProphet/pseuds/MrProphet
Summary: In large part, this fic owes its existence to the casting of Juliet Aubrey in both Primeval and Middlemarch, albeit about a decade apart.





	A Key to All Mythologies

_The inspiration to compose this work was sent to me in a vision most profound and holy. To this day I can produce no evidence to support the veracity of the vision as more than a figment of the mind, save only the circumstantial disappearance of a number of small, metal objects from my study. Nonetheless, I have never questioned either the source of the vision, or its portent._

_It happened that on the 14th day of June, in the year of Our Lord 1807, I returned to my study not long after leaving it, to retrieve certain documents which I had, being preoccupied with higher matters, left upon my desk, yet which were most pressingly required for the debate to which I was bound. Being of most punctilious habit I had, for certain, left my study both empty and locked upon quitting the chamber not ten minutes before._

_Yet, when I opened the door, I beheld a most wondrous sight. A dark angel stood within, wreathed in a radiance most celestial. He was by his garb a man, or at least masculine, and had a manly strength in his bearing. Yet he was long haired and possessed an almost feminine beauty. His aspect was dark, yet more pleasing than that of any mortal man of such swarthy tone._

_This heavenly visitor gazed upon me with wise and reverent eyes and said unto me: ‘Edward Casaubon; you shall be the author of a key to all mythologies, and the glory of your scholarship shall shine through all the works of man._

Sarah gawped openly. “‘Reverent eyes?’” she demanded.

“Wise and reverent,” Connor said, holding out the book. “See for yourself.”

Sarah read through the passage herself. “ _Almost_  feminine?”

Cutter smiled softly. “Well, 19th Century scholars were a pretty sheltered bunch,” he reminded her.

“And racist with it!”

“Oh, I’m not defending him. I just don’t want you to take it personally.”

“Right,” Connor agreed. “You are  _totally_  feminine and you don’t dress like a man at all.”

“Connor,” Abby sighed, “shut up now.”

“Right.”

“And all I said was: ‘You’re Edward Casaubon! You wrote the Key to All Mythologies.’ Which he didn’t,” Sarah added. “It was his widow did all the work.” She turned the book over in her hands. “Anyway, where did you get a first edition? Weren’t there only a few hundred ever printed?”

“One hundred and fifty,” Cutter agreed. “Most of those either disappeared or stayed in the family.”

“You know they reprint this for less than a fiver?  _Please_  tell me that my taxes didn’t pay for the embossed cover and the smug introduction.”

“Wedding present from Helen’s parents,” Cutter explained. “Family heirloom.”

**Author's Note:**

> In large part, this fic owes its existence to the casting of Juliet Aubrey in both Primeval and Middlemarch, albeit about a decade apart.


End file.
